Metadata, ripping

In yesterday's post I turned you on to SongKong, one of the better programs for fixing your metadata - the information embedded in each track of music containing all the details - like title, artist, time, recording technique, etc. SongKong really works and does an excellent job at fixing what it wrong. Unlike it's biggest competitor, Tuneup, which consistently freezes up and causes me grief (rant), SongKong is a pleasure to use. But programs like these fix what's missing and incorrect in your library. How do we get the tracks and music into our libraries in the first place? If we download them from Blue Coast, Arkiv (for classical), HD Tracks, or Acoustic Sounds, we're pretty much assured the metadata that comes with them is perfect - and we need do nothing else. But, what of our big CD libraries? If you're like me, most of your music is trapped in the little shiny discs lining our music room shelves. Ripping that information onto a hard drive can be easy or it can be a pain - and in either case - how do you get metadata when you copy a CD to the hard drive? The metadata on the CD itself is extremely limited: track number, title, time and format's about it. Tomorrow let's focus on how to extract music onto a hard drive with metadata.